She Promised Us Each a Quilt
by Gabby Gilliam
The pain in my mother’s wrists
doesn’t discriminate––throbbing
within taut tissue as she pulls
another stretch of quilt across
the sewing machine’s arm.
Since my father’s funeral
she has attacked her fabric stash
a torrent of stitches to distract her
from his absence. She lets his loss
pool in the shadows at her feet
nudges it aside to press the pedal
as she feeds pinned squares
to the needle. When the sun dips
below the treeline, she leans
over to turn on the light.
PAINTING: Patchwork quilt, watercolor by Undrey.
NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: My parents would have celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in November 2023, but we lost my dad in 2021. Since then, my mother has spent every day distracting herself from the emptiness in their house. She’s turned their living room into a sewing room––fabric and batting all over the place. She’s given herself a mission to make a quilt for each of us (daughters and grandchildren). She’s nearly half-way finished.
PHOTO: The author (right) with her mother at her wedding in 2010.
AUTHOR’S PHOTO CAPTION: My mother made this quilt for my son. It’s been in use ever since she made it for him. My mom chose the center panel because my son loves to read, and was making his own books for a short time. She then went through her stash of scrap fabrics to find coordinating colors and patterns to use for the rest of the quilt. She does her best to make all of the quilts with fabric she already has on hand, as she wants to work her way through her impressive inventory instead of buying anything new. If she gave herself over to quilting completely, she could likely finish one in a week or so, but she often works on them in between other projects, so it’s sometimes a couple of months before she finishes one. There are usually a few quilts in progress at a time, one being cut, one being pinned, and one being sewn. She will likely take a break from quilting soon as she finds it harder to sew in the warm weather and is most productive in the winter months, the cold and darkness much better sewing companions than the light.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Gabby Gilliam is a writer, an aspiring teacher, and a mom. She lives in the Washington DC metro area with her husband and son. Her poetry has appeared in One Art, Anti-Heroin Chic, Plant-Human Quarterly, The Ekphrastic Review, Vermillion, Deep Overstock, Spank the Carp, and others. Her fiction has appeared in Grim & Gilded and multiple anthologies. You can find her online at gabbygilliam.com or on Facebook.
Silver Birch Press 